Important Announcement – Pause of Sales to EU and US

Although Australia Post has announced resumption of parcel services to the US, partnering with a third party to remit tariff charges and taxes, the cost of this service to small retailers is excessive. The Delivery Duty Paid options through FedEx/DHL/Aramax/Toll are also prohibitively expensive for small shipments.

It has become increasingly difficult to prepare and process parcels for shipment to the EU and US. Resulting changes to import policies in the US and EU have created an environment where personal imports are no longer a simple option for the purchaser and the retailer. Both the EU and US have removed the de minimus which may be manageable but many EU states and the US also levy a handling fee for processing imports as well as a wide variation of tariff levels dependent upon the origin of a product. This can exceed the value of the shipment and impose additional costs on the retailer.

Changes to import duties, taxes and fees of postal services to the European Union:

The European Union (EU) has announced customs and import Value Added Tax (VAT) changes effective 1 July 2026, impacting postal sending to all EU member states.

Similar to the US, Zonos® will support the calculation, collection and remittance of duties, taxes and fees (“landed costs”) that are now applicable to EU-bound shipments.

What’s changing:

The EU is removing the EUR150 (AUD$246.83) de minimis threshold that has previously allowed low-value goods to pass into the EU free of customs duty. 

From 1 July 2026, all items sent to the EU, except for gifts valued below EUR45 (AUD$75), will be subject to customs duty and VAT:

Parcels valued under EUR150: VAT will apply to the parcel, along with a flat-rate customs duty fee of EUR3 (AUD$4.95) per item.

Parcels valued over EUR150: the existing customs duty and tax processes will continue to apply. 

This customs duty fee of EUR3 will apply per item, not per parcel – the fee will be charged for every distinct item in your parcel. Under the EU’s Delegated Regulation, an ‘item’ is defined as goods in a parcel that share the same HS tariff code, item description and (where required) country of origin.

A parcel with three goods that differ on any of those criteria – and therefore classified as three distinct items – will be charged EUR9, not EUR3.

Currently the EU and US have not provided a realistic pathway for registering for Value Added Tax collection or Tariff collection. The procedures so far in place are time consuming and carry high fees and charges. The EU product safety rules also require an individual resident in the EU to be the nominated representative for the product being imported.

This is not affordable or manageable for small enterprises like ours, therefore we have reluctantly decided to wait until the US and EU markets have a realistic method of facilitating sales.

We have decided pause sales to the EU, as we will not collect taxes and tariffs for the various EU governments because we have no clear method of remittance available to comply with this administrative burden.